Trickling Forgiveness
by PrairieLily
Summary: Sherlock is out of 221B as it's being restored, and out of his element, struggling to explain to Molly about that phone call, and convey his true feelings without being kicked out onto the street. Two chapters. As I've written it's complete and ready to be uploaded. No copyright infringment is intended. Spoilers for Season/Series 4 episode 3 "The Final Problem".
1. Chapter 1

Sherlock Holmes stood in front of the door, uncharacteristically hesitant. He wasn't sure if it was foolishness brought on by exhaustion, or true courage that had brought him here so soon.

Finally, he rang the bell, and after a few moments of private awkwardness, the door was opened.

"What do you want", Molly Hooper asked flatly. Sherlock didn't even blink. He deserved that, and whatever of her wrath that was still coming to him. He braced himself for it and decided to take it the same as he had taken the beating from John in that morgue, Culverton Smith's so-called favourite room. Sometimes, it seemed, self-loathing was the only real emotion Sherlock Holmes could experience.

At least, it seemed, until Eurus.

"I need to ask a favour, Molly. I mean," he said, suddenly aware of the awkwardness, "if you're willing to listen and put me up… well I mean… put up with me… Molly…" he trailed off, his deep timbre voice suddenly sounding tired, and unsure.

Something about that tugged at Molly's heart, and she hated herself for it.

"Well. Don't just stand there. Come on now."

She stood aside, refusing eye contact, and let him in. He entered the flat with little hesitation, fearing she may change her mind and slam the door in his face.

"Molly… I know this is forward. But I need to ask if you will… I mean if I could possibly… well 221B… as you know our flat is quite literally flat. For the time being, I need somewhere to stay. John gave up the flat he had with Mary when he moved back in with me, and he and Rosie have arrangements but… well I'm rather homeless."

Molly wanted to be firm, she wanted to be as much of an asshole as he had been two days ago. She frankly wanted to tell him to piss off. But she found herself looking against her own will up at him. His eyes that she could never quite decide on, his long dark curls that made her catch her breath, and those cheekbones. Oh, those cheekbones. She knew that the moment he opened his mouth to speak, that voice would do her in.

"Alright then," she said, softening more than she wanted to. "I suppose you can stay here until 221B has been restored."

Sherlock's features relaxed somewhat. "It's only temporary," he emphasized.

Molly seemed to ignore it. "I'm making tea," she said casually, striding towards the kitchen. "Would you like a cup?"

"Yes, I would, thank you," he replied quickly. He relieved himself of his coat and scarf, draping them over the back of the sofa, and stood, unsure what to say or do next. He knew what needed to be said, but it was all so overwhelming, he had no idea where to even begin. Finally, gazing over at Molly preparing their tea, but engulfed in his own mind and not really seeing her or what she was doing, he decided. The best would be to start in the middle, where Molly entered stage right into the sick and twisted tale his sister had authored. She really did deserve an explanation sooner rather than later.

"Molly… I have a lot of explaining to do… and I must be honest. I was hoping that if you were to allow me to stay here for a time that it would give me the opportunity to explain myself fully."

Molly tried to appear aloof, but found her attention piqued. She did love the man, exasperating as he was and as much of a dick as he had been with that phone call. Those feelings that had begun and built for so many years couldn't be erased so easily, and she had been gutted and absolutely spent by it. But still, she loved him. "Would you like it with lemon?" she asked, looking across the room at him, trying to keep up the façade of being angry. Sherlock nodded silently.

Sherlock sat himself down on the sofa and waited quietly, not wanting to exasperate her by "helping" in the kitchen. When Molly appeared in front of him with the cups and handed one to him, the lemon wedge perched on the rim, he glanced at it for a few moments before setting it down. Finally, he gathered his thoughts and looked at her. No time like the present, and nothing like diving straight into the matter.

"It would seem that I have a sister, and her name is Eurus. And the hell she has brought upon all of us, including you my darling, is going to be a very, very long story."

Molly's heart skipped a beat at the words 'my darling', but wondered if he meant anything by it. It certainly wasn't anything he'd ever said to her before. But something told her that she was in for a long, long night, and Sherlock, her darling Sherlock, was going to be in it with her.


	2. Chapter 2

_This is the second and final chapter to this story. While Sherlock tells Molly in great detail, I will not be. The story of what happened to him, John, and Mycroft at the hands of Eurus at Sherrinford and then their childhood home is not a story that belongs to me - it belongs to the writers of Sherlock. I apologize also for the weird formatting in my first attempt to post this chapter._

Molly lay awake in her bed, her arm draped lovingly and protectively around the man who slept soundly next to her, his head resting comfortably against her. The soft dark curls framing his chiseled features were askew, his breathing soft and regular. A faint lingering scent of the antiseptic she had applied to his hands shortly before they had turned in wafted up, reminding her what he had done in his rage at what he had been forced to do to her – a part of his story that she had finally made him tell, and one of the last parts he had managed before crashing for the night.

What he had already told her was a lot to process, and he had only barely just begun. She wondered absently why he slept so soundly, when she was wide awake, her thoughts so overwhelmed. Then she remembered that he was mentally and physically spent, he knew the story already from start to finish, and he had used up the last of his reserves trying to tell her even the beginning of it. He had finally crashed next to the one person he needed most to be near, the one person he most needed to make amends to, and the only person aside from John Watson that he trusted to see him so vulnerable. Molly stroked the loose curls softly, absently, trying to allow the gentle rhythm of his breathing lull her to sleep.

She had listened intently and patiently to what he had to say, understanding that this was just the tip of the iceberg.

When she had invited Sherlock to share her bed, he hadn't said a word. He had simply found just enough energy to kiss her softly, his love and gratitude unmistakable to her. He had watched as she settled herself, and slipped gratefully under the covers next to her. In the same time it had taken for him to roll towards her and settle against her, feeling in her embrace safe and secure for the first time in days after the trauma of Sherrinford and Musgrave, he had fallen into a deep, long-awaited slumber.

Thankfully, Sherlock had begun for Molly's sake by skipping ahead to that fateful phone call, the one that explained the splinters in his knuckles, seemingly forgotten in his absent way, until he picked up the lemon wedge and began to squeeze it into his tea. The sting of the juice contacting some of the small, but numerous lacerations on his hands and knuckles, and the surprised look of stinging pain on his face, made Molly take notice and look down at them. "Sherlock, what have you done to your hands?" she asked, concerned.

The detective shook his head impatiently. He had only just managed to form a halfassed working plan in his head as to where to start, he didn't want that to be derailed. "I'll get to that, please Molly, just listen. They're just scratches, really."

"Bollocks," Molly muttered, but consented to wait until later to treat the wounds. Knowing him as she did, however, she wondered if he was withstanding the pain because he felt he deserved it.

"I need you to do something for me, Molly", Sherlock had said. "I know you love me. You've already said it. And I also know why it was so difficult for you to say in the first place… but Molly darling," – there was that damnable "darling" again from him – "I need you to tell me again why it was so hard to say. I need to know that we are on the same page before I can go any further."

Molly wanted to slap him.

"Why are you still doing this?" she asked, tears welling up and her heart starting to ache again.

"It's not my intention to hurt you, really it isn't. I just need for you to trust me Molly, one more time, please just trust me. I promise you with everything in my heart that you will not regret it."

Sherlock held his breath, waiting.

"What exactly is in your heart, Sherlock Holmes?"

He really should have anticipated that, he thought. Stupid, stupid careless wording. Those damned emotions Eurus had let loose… he really wasn't ready for all of this so quickly. Well no matter now, in for a penny, in for a pound.

"You are, Molly. You are in my heart. Molly please… please trust me, just one more time."

Molly felt as if she were in some kind of emotional gale with no way out and no way to control the direction she was taken in. So she went with it. "I couldn't say it… because it's true."

Sherlock took a sharp, deep breath and let it out with relief. "Right, then," he said, almost urgently. "With that having been said, why do you suppose it was so difficult for me to say as well?"

Molly started. What the hell was he getting on about? She slowly looked up, meeting his eyes. There, she found a tenderness and desperation she'd rarely encountered before in such combination in him. "Because," she stammered, "it's… true for you as well?"

Sherlock smiled softly, grateful she seemed to be on the same page. "Yes. It's true for me as well. I love you, Molly. I don't know for how long, I know that I have cared for you since the moment I met you, but I don't know that I loved you, not yet. I certainly didn't act as if I did. God, I was such a dick to you. Dismissing your feelings, spurning you at every turn, humiliating you, I honestly don't know how or why you put up with my bullshit. I only know that I feel that way now and I hope that's enough."

Molly's heart started pounding in her chest, and she felt faint. She said nothing, listening, waiting for the swirly feeling to pass. Sherlock observed that she wasn't quite able to focus for a moment. He waited her to absorb what he'd just said before continuing. He was, frankly, grateful for the moment to regroup his thoughts. The admission had taken more out of him than he had anticipated it would.

"The first time I said it the other night, I confess I was desperate to save your life. At that moment I thought you had literally only seconds left to live and I was desperate to make you say those words. To make you say I love you, so you might live. Eurus had said that she would kill you if you didn't say those words… and at that time we had no reason to disbelieve her, we couldn't risk it. We had no choice. But the second time I said it, I realized in a blinding flash that it was true, and that's why it came so much more easily." He paused a moment, glancing at her carefully, gauging her, deciding what to elaborate on next.

"Molly this is all so new to me. Everything I have been, has been because of my sister. Everything that has happened to all of us has been because of her actions. My emotional detachment since childhood has been because of her. I have been emotionally crippled and stunted because of Eurus. But now I really need to explain all of this in order… I mean, now that you're willing to listen. You are willing to listen, aren't you?" He had found that he had turned towards her on the sofa, in his sudden rush of words, tumbling over each other to get out in a coherent order. Without realizing it, she had taken his hands in hers. The sting of her fingers absently examining the wounds from his burst of primal rage on the coffin that had been meant to represent her – and would be explained very soon - brought him to attention again.

Forgiveness was beginning to trickle in, she realized, and it made it so much easier for her to breathe again. She gently tugged at his wrist, one of the only places that wasn't festering with neglected splinters, prompting him gently and wordlessly to rise to his feet.

"Of course I will listen. But as 221B is going to take some time, I assume we will have several days for you to tell me what you need to. Tell me only until you've had enough for the night, then we'll turn in. Darling, you look like death warmed over." She smiled up at the quizzical expression on his face at the word "Darling". A part of her savoured the brief crinkling of a cautious smile at the corners of his mouth. He was also starting to realize that forgiveness was beginning to trickle in.

She began to lead him towards the kitchen, where she had her first aid kit stored. "We have plenty of time."

"A lifetime, I hope," he simply said, stepping forward, trusting her, following her, whatever might come.


End file.
